To be held
It’s 2 am and you’re in the midst of a deep sleep. All of a sudden, sensations return, your consciousness comes alive and everything feels a bit fuzzy. “Where am I? What time is it? Is everything ok?” It’s pitch black and you’re being swallowed by the thick sweatsuit you insisted on sleeping in and the 14 blankets you absolutely must pile on top of you for a good nights rest. You blink open your left eye, still squinting your right one heavily. As you start to make sense of your surroundings, you begin to feel around for what you soon realize is no longer there. Still half dreaming, half awake, the reality you’ve been unsuccessfully avoiding sets back in.
He’s not there.
An all-too-familiar feeling returns to your eyes as they begin wallowing up with tears. You start repeating yourself over and over, “It’s ok, it’s all going to be ok.” You reach to your right, where the tissue box you’ve had to replace about three times now should be, only to find it empty once again.
To be held. It’s a sacred art of sorts. You often hear about the intimacy of staring into someone’s eyes, holding hands for the first time, physically consummating your love. But what I have yet to come across, is literature solely surrounding what it is to simply be held.
When we are born, the first thing that the nurse asks our mother is if she would like to hold her baby. Before we were forced to endure the heartbreak and healing that so often mirrors what it’s like to live life here on Earth, we were held. Before we knew loss, before we knew grief, before we knew anger or sadness or anxiety, disappointment or loneliness or abandonment, we were held.
As a 31 year old girl who has single-handedly endured all of the above, I can tell you firsthand that if you ask me what I want, what I truly want more than anything in the world, it is to be held.
Growing up as an only child, I’ve been independent my entire life. I suppose you can say it’s in my DNA. I recharge in the comfort of my own bed, and am often stimulated by my own thoughts and ideas. I have weathered many storms and learned to paddle my own canoe throughout the varying tides of life. I have fallen down more times than you could probably ever imagine, but somehow have learned to pick myself back up each and every time, no matter how hard it felt in the moment.
I couldn’t be prouder of the woman I have become. The thing is, no matter how independent I am or how capable I am of being on my own, I am ready to be held.
I experienced a glimpse of what it feels like quite recently, and have been having trouble letting go of that sensation. Once you get a peek into all that you know you deserve, it can be quite difficult to release your grip once it becomes apparent that the storyline you were a part of had to end. It’s especially hard when it gets cut off much earlier than you thought it would, and made even harder when you didn’t think it would end at all.
Being held is not simply physical in nature. It has a deeply emotional component too. It is a combination of feeling heard, feeling seen and feeling understood in a way you never have before. It can also be quite spiritual and outer worldly.
To be held is to be seen not only through the lens by which you’re looking, but to expand and explore places beyond space and time that allow for a depth of connection much further than what this realm seems to allow.
Many of my friends are on their first, second and third babies. I see engagement announcements on my timeline more often than birthdays these days. If it’s not an engagement, then it’s a wedding, a gender reveal, or an anniversary celebration of some sort. It seems everybody’s finding their match and I thought I finally found mine. I guess I was mistaken.
Believe me, with each celebration, I couldn’t be happier for the people I love the most. To be honest, I couldn’t be happier for the strangers I’ve never even met. I find myself hysterically crying over proposal videos, giggling uncontrollably at wedding speeches and feeling deeply emotional when reading the origins of couples love stories.
I love love, I always have and I always will. I’m just ready to be held by someone that isn’t temporary. I am ready to outline every freckle on his thumb with my eyes closed and trace each line on his palm as if it were my own. I am ready for someone who wants to do the same for me. I am ready to love and be loved, choose and be chosen and reciprocally dive straight into the depths of feelings themselves without an ounce of hesitation.
Waking up at 2 AM without the comfort of a bicep around your waist can be quite confronting you see. I suppose it’s kind of beautiful that no matter what, I can always count on the comfort of me.
If you can relate, you’re not alone and I hope you find solace in the comfort of you too.
With love and so much light,
Alexa 💡
P.s. If you want to hold my hand through this season of life, come subscribe and join my Substack family. I’m new here and your support means the world & allows me to keep doing what I love and sharing my heart even though it’s kind of terrifying.
Alexa, your line “before we knew loss, before we knew grief…we were held” is devastatingly beautiful—it anchors your whole essay in something primal and true. What shines here is your bravery in naming the paradox: fiercely independent, proud of your strength, and yet still longing for arms that are not temporary. That honesty, without apology, felt like being invited into your 2 AM moment—sacred, raw, human. Reading this, I didn’t just feel your ache, I felt the universality of it: the art of being held as something we all secretly crave.
– JTS
Today, instead of reading me, go see and read one other Substack writer and leave them a thoughtful comment. When we do that, we’re all seen, and we’re all read.
You wrote this so beautifully, it hurts. It is the ache of not being held, absence of knowing someone got you no matter what.